Birthday Wish for Malaysia

Today is Malaysia's 50th Merdeka - Happy Merdeka !

Its almost end of the Merdeka Day. This year's celebration has been just so-so, not as grand and impressive as I would have expected. But I guess, we should be more concern about the meaning of our country achieving 50 years of independence. It is only befitting that there is a birthday wish on a birthday. As a Malaysian, I wish that

• In years to come, Malaysia will be a place where everyone is treated equally and fairly. No more differentiating its citizens by race or religion or bumi/non-bumi. As such, our MyKad should not even store such information. I wish that there wont be a 'Bangsa' (Race) and 'Agama' (Religion) section in all the forms. Just 'Kewarganegaraan' ( Nationality ) - end of story.


• Politicians would not try to wave keris around, instilling lies and hatred, and thus hurting the feelings of its citizens in the process. I wish that there would be more politicians who are sincere in looking after the plight of the people instead of self-interest.


• There wont be anymore people left behind by development, and still live in absolute poverty.


• Malaysians would become less reliant on foreign-labour. It takes a little effort from everyone to support this.


• The streets of our cities or kampungs are safe to walk at night or day, so that we dont have be constantly alert for snatch thiefs, robbers, rapist, kidnappers, road bullies or Mat Rempit.


• I wish that there would be a time where there is freedom of speech, and stuff like news black-out does not occur. A time where we can believe what is being written on mainstream newpaper. No one would threaten to silence bloggers and that information flow honest and freely.

Hmmm.. that's quite a long list already actually. Is there a limit as to how many wish allow for birthdays ? I wonder....

Happy merdeka again ! ( before the clock strikes 12 )

Reading update

I am now reading a book - The Chinese Malaysian Contribution. Just started off with the few pages. Bought the book quite some time back when it was launched by Tun Dr Mahathir.

I'll be sharing some interesting stuff from the book. Its pretty interesting really. I just realised how little i knew.

Minister's Report Card

This morning heard on 988 on this interesting website http://www.citizenthinktank.com/ that was setup to rate our politicians. Malaysians, in general, vote for parties instead of voting for the candidate. Not much is known about what the person elected actually achieved in their term. So this is a pretty good idea. Its like a minister's report card.

I checked out the website.. its still pretty new, but its a good start at least...

Most of the time, we ( at least me ) would have visibility on those famous (infamous) ministers who

• Who shock everyone by waving keris on the stage
• Who blames tragedy on mother nature
• Who tried to avoid answering questions on AP
• Who try to make a big deal out of a teenager song

I only see a few good ministers doing a real solid work ... like our Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr Chua Soi Lek. Really admire his way.

Scary Drop

Today our KLCI went tumbling down 46 points just like that. What a scary drop ! Its like bungee jumping.

Yeah... lately, I have been monitoring the share market these few days. I watched the the US market, then follow by the rest of the world markets all in red for the entire week. Few months back, a drop of 10 points or so in a single day, people already hoo-hah here and there.

Of course, i too, got burnt a few fingers myself. But is a small burnt, as compared to those big players out there. I am just ikan-bilis investor mah. My friends are different. A few of them are daring and adventurous -- who plays with futures. And here I am, sitting here wondering what is their fate. It is an area I dont have the courage nor knowledge to venture into. With futures, what you can potentially loss is theoritically unlimited ~ infinity. With stocks, the most I can lost is what I invested. Futures players gotta have strong and healthy heart.

Its quite impossible to assess how much further the market can drop. I would be rich by now, if I can predict !!

It'll be interesting to see what happens tommorow.

Surviving the first week ...

Today is my 2nd week in my new job, i survived a one whole week of mix of excitement and extreme boringness. Thanks to blogs reading, internet surfiing, yahoo games and my msn & yahoo messenger friends who chatted with me to keep my sanity intact.

I landed myself into another totally different world. It is exciting, but the amount of vocabularies and acronyms is almost overwhelming at first. I was given reading material, and for every page there is at least 20 or so words that I couldnt really understand. I was in a slight panicky at first. I couldnt understand what is CCY .... asked around and found out it is a short form for currency ! Imagine how dumb i felt. Then there was this CRM that kept repeating all over the documents ... which i assumed it stands for Customer Relationship Management. Only later found out how far it was from what it meant. Shit ! I am really in another planet.

Then I started an excel file and list down all the words that are Greek to me. One by one, I look them up at Wikipedia.... the best tool of the century !! After one week of slogging thru the reading materials, the words finally start to make sense. Guess what, after one week, i have a nice list of 100+ new words/acronyms. I havent done this since my primary school. Phew.... that was hard work.

Although i inevitably lost myself in the KL roads, so far i manage to make my way back home. So far, have not yet need to stop and ask the police to send me home.... heheh. Maybe i got some built-in homing device in me.

A small milestone ... but milestone nonetheless.

Expensive Bunga Raya

It is an sarcastic insult that our national flower has been used as a reason to justify for this kind of trip. What were these councilmen thinking when they made this decision ? Did they they think no one would ever know ......

RM70,380 bunga raya trip
By Sheridan Mahavera

09 August, 2007

JOHOR BARU: In February last year, six Johor Baru municipal councilmen took their families to Australia and spent RM70,380 of taxpayers’ money — to learn how to plant bunga raya! Ten months later, another group of councilmen, this time from Kluang, went to Shanghai on another trip paid for by taxpayers.The objective of the trip is unclear, but the councillors made the trip at the height of the catastrophic floods which hit Johor, when most areas of their district were submerged in knee-deep water.

Parking Lessons

Today is free parking today ! At least to me it is almost free. I paid only 1 buck only for parking right in front of my office for whole day. The meter feeder ate my one dollar coins and it gleefully choke up to 3 hours of car park. I suspect the meter is faulty – where got parking so cheap one. That can’t be right. But who cares anyway. I was pretty pleased with myself until my colleagues told me that nobody feeds the meter yet coz there were newly installed last week. Then, I felt pretty dumbo.

After yesterday car park ticket of RM19.50 at PWTC, which I had to pay thru my nose, and almost choked myself in the process. I stubbornly refuse to tell hubby how much the PWTC parking cost, not that he didn’t try to make me talk. He got a weak heart – that’s why I wont tell him. Anyway, that gotta be the first and the last time. PWTC parking is not safe. By the time I collect my car around 8pm, there was hardly anyone around except a few guards here and there. I had to walk a long, long way pass long, dark, eerie corridors and pathway before I finally reached the car park. By the time, I already feel my toes starting to cramp.

The day before, I stupidly parked at the 3rd party car park at Hartamas and paid RM10 (which was the maximum payable). After I nicely parked my car, then only I notice plenty of car park lots around seemed to be free.

Oh well… that all the tuition fees I had to pay to know how much parking fees cost in KL. I found this one website telling about KL open car parks – this gonna be my cost-saving tool in future. As a newbie to KL, I still have a lot to learn.

Time to blog

My blog off and on, not a very regular blogger. It pretty much depends on my mood actually.

What actually makes a conducive environment to blog ? What turns me on is ....

1. Where no people snooping around ur laptop
2. When i am bored, or excited ... I tend to blog.
3. When one is annoymous blogger.... i personally dont want my family or circle of friends to be reading some nasty comment that i made.
4. When i have a lot to express

Now is just the right time & right place & right mood for blogging. I have been itching for a day or two already. Reasons might be

• I am real bored now
• I am a stranger in a new city
• I am constantly lost ( both spiritually and on the roads )
• My boss is far far away.

Yea... i sense that the time has come.